SecondFlock
by Ruko777
Summary: This is the story of the other flock. Crag's flock. They grew in another school, escaped to a different place, but wind up meating when Crag...well, read and find out!
1. The Flock Members

_**The Flock Members**_

**Crag **(Flock leader)**:**

Age: 14

Gender: Male

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Light brown hair with lighter, dirty blond streaks, and deep, smooth, brown eyes. His wings are brown and white with gold flecks.

Description: Crag is not very sarcastic and witty. But, like most of the flock, he likes to taunt his enemy first then kick butt. He tries as hard as he can to protect his flock, and keep their spirits high, even in the worst of times. He, being the flock leader, cares for his flock first, himself second.

Abilities:Can heat his body to extreme temperatures, which also allows him to make things combust or melt, along with the ability to send massive electric jolts through anything he touches.

**Jay:**

Age: 14

Gender: Female

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Black hair with unusual silvery streaks and reflective grey eyes (see description). Jay's wings are, as her name suggests, a blue jay's wings. Shades of blue and black and white streaks and spots.

Description:Where Crag lacks in edge, Jay makes up for it with her attitude. While still in the lab they grew up in, the whitecoats there tried a second attempt in enhancing an avian-human's sight (after their failure with Iggy in another lab [or "school"]), this time with the aid of implants in her eyes and brain. It replaced her eyesight with a sort-of sixth sense, which she describes as torture, because its like her eyes are teasing her because she can sense things, but she knows she can never actually see them.

Abilities: Can release supersonic screams, often making electronics short circuit, and, as said above, a sixth sense.

**Gale:**

Age: 13

Gender: Female

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Wavy, darker golden hair that falls down just past her shoulders and light sky blue eyes. Her wings are white with a little gold.

Description: Gale is the calm, quiet, rational one in this flock. She always cares very much for everyone in her flock and can always keep her calm. Except in battle, when she is, surprisingly, one of the most formidable.

Abilities: Can emit stunning, and even killing, intense flashes of light.

**Cloud:**

Age: 11

Gender: Male

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Cloud has curly blond hair, somewhat like Gale's (they're siblings), and frosty blue eyes. His wings are a light rust-brown, with lighter primaries.

Description: Cloud has a very kind personality. He is also quick witted and likes to keep up the flock's spirits with jokes and puns, which he comes up with very fast. He would do anything for his flock.

Abilities: Cloud has very speedy movements. He is very fast, at running, flying, roundhouse kicking, everything. He is also very inelegant. His whole flock is uneducated, but he has a mind for science and math and logical things.

**Talon **(**Tal**)**:**

Age: 9

Gender: Female

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Talon has slightly pail skin with long, silky black hair and dark eyes. Tal's wings are stark black with soft down and stiff flight feathers.

Description:She always has to be doing something. The only time when she does nothing is when she is sleeping. She is constantly the first one to jump right into a battle, and the one with the highest outward show of rage. Her icy glare sends a chill down anyone's spine.

Abilities: Talon has the ability to know reality. She, or anybody else, doesn't know how it works, but she knows the real nature of things, and where and what they are to an extent. She also has developed sharp, claw-like fingernails that are retractable.

**Miel:**

Age: 6

Gender: Male

Hair/Eyes/Wings: Miel's wings are a rusty-yellow. His hair is a mid-shade of strawberry blond and his eyes are light brown.

Description: Miel is always getting into mischief, pulling pranks (pretty ingenious ones for a six-year-old) and going off to "do it himself" when he doesn't realize how dangerous the situation really is.

Abilities:Can re size and somewhat morph his body to an extent, which annoys the other flock members, because this aids in his drive for mischief.

This alternate flock grew up in a different lab than Max's. Their ages are similar to the other flock's, though, because the two "schools" had an unspoken revelry between them. They were constantly trying to outdo one another at what the other accomplished. So, as it turned out, their ages, among other things, are somewhat like each other.


	2. The Flock History

**A/N: I know it isn't put together all that well, but some things were hard to work around to make it possible for there to be two flocks. So with this in mind, enjoy and review!!!**

_**Brief history of the flocks.**_

The flocks were born in two different labs. One in Death Valley, California, and one in Tippett, Nevada. Once the idea of human-avian hybrids were conceived, these two "Schools" both pounced on the project at once. As one made the first two avian-humans, the ones in power over both of these facilities made the first lab give one up to the second, to further the variety of research and development. This was how the unspoken rivalry of the two labs occurred. Once one facility made a hybrid, the other tried to outdo it, so the two flocks wound up having relatively the same ages.

Then one of the flocks escaped, Max's flock, with the help of Jeb Batchelder. Jeb was one of the only whitecoats who did not take part in the rivalry between the two facilities, so he spent time in both places and formed secret relationships with both groups of mutants. So when Jeb lived with Max and her flock, the second flock, Crag's flock, felt betrayed and angry at Jeb for disappearing to who-knows-where because of who-knows-what. Then Jeb left the first flock to go and help the other flock escape (once he was sure Max could take care of everybody and herself). As soon Crag and his flock had escaped, and were settled into another house in the mountains, far from Max, they disowned him and he left, not even willing to tell them why he had disappeared those years ago, and they were left to find out about the outside world for themselves. They made their way, not without troubles, but those made them stronger. So though they spent more time in a "school" as the first flock, they are just as strong.

**A/N: This flock has had many adventures thus far, but I will only start to narrate them from the point near to where they meat the first flock, Max's flock, and maybe continue from there. So, without further adieu, _The Alternate Flock._**


	3. Chapter 1: The Seventh

**Disclaimer: I have sometimes taken quotes directly from the Maximum Ride books, which I do not take credit for. That goes to James Patterson.**

_**Crag POV**_

First things first: I'm Crag and I'm a fourteen-year-old mutant freak. Now, you might say my life is stressful, trying to keep five younger kids alive, and myself, and away from werewolves, cyborgs, robots, robots made to look like werewolves, and a bunch of other weird things like that. You might say that. And you might be right. Okay, you are right. VERY right. If my life became any more stressful, I would jump off a cliff. Actually, I HAVE jumped off a cliff. Ubernumerous times. More times than you've said the word 'cliff' in your life. But that's only because of the WINGS genetically grafted onto my back. What? Never heard of a kid with wings? **(A/N: Then what the heck are you doing in the Maximum Ride section??? Durrr.)**

Anyway, I would just LOVE to go into the whole shpeil of my life I've told a million people a million different times, but I am currently fighting to the death with about a bagillion of those robots I told you about, so if you'll excuse me…

"WHERE…IS…MY…FLOCK…YOU…FREAKING…B******!?"

Yeah I'm pretty flared up.

**_Max POV_**

"Surfacing!"

I dashed over to and up the ladder as fast as I could, which is pretty freaking fast, considering I am genetically enhanced. _AIRAIRAIR!!! _was all I was thinking the whole way. We, the Flock, have been stuck in this airtight, mouse hole of a hell for twelve hours. TWELVE HOURS. That my not seem like that long to you "hey-look-at-me-I'm-all-100%-human!" people, but to us birdkids, well, lets just say I practically broke the hinges off the thick, STEEL breech door of the submarine on my way into the blessed fresh air.

I stopped dead at the top of the ladder, opened the door, and breathed in deeply. Then the five voices behind me started to shout and push me further up and out, and the rest of my flock zipped out. First was fang, who then turned around to help Iggy up, then Gazzy, Nudge, and Angel followed in suit. Total wriggled out of Angel's arms and galloped near to the edge of the sub.

"I tell you, there is NOTHING like a chilling sea breeze after half a day of fresh air deprivation." I rolled my eyes but kept taking huge gulps of life-giving oxygen.

Then, after a few more seconds of glorious breathing, I asked the captain, who had come up after us along with John Abate and Brigid Dwyer "So how come we're here?"

"We're picking up a marine biologist," Captain Perry explained.

"A colleague of ours," said John. "She specializes in bony fish, which are mostly what the dead groups have consisted of."

_Great, another biologist to gape and poke at us. _So we waited. And waited some more. And then, ooh, guess what, we waited a bit longer! After a bit, Captain Perry and the others started to get anxious. Captain Perry looked at his watched and grumbled something incoherent. "Where is she?" John wondered to himself.

I happened to glance at Iggy, who was nearest to the side of the boat the dock was on. He looked puzzled, with his head turned in the slightest way, like he was listening to something far off.

"What's up Ig?"

But my question was answered in just a few moments because then I too could hear the far-off guns and the occasional _BOOM! _that came from the shore somewhere. _Great, just what I need. Why does this ALWAYS happen to me? Couldn't Mr. Chu-Chu go bother some other mutants and give us a break?!_

Then heard the sound of crashing footsteps, coming nearer. The rest of the flock and I joined him on the side of the sub, craning our necks to see and shading our eyes (except Iggy of course). Then, in just a few moments, a short, tan woman with a long, grey haired braid, burst out of the woods. _Holey crap_, I thought, _she looks like she just crawled through six miles of rose bushes! _Her clothes were torn and she had red marks on her cheeks, like she let branches whip back at her while running through the woods, and her hair had bits of leaves in them. Her eyes were like dinner plates and she was missing a shoe.

"Noelani? What the--"

"Monsters!! Robots!! Guns!!" The lady shrieked as she ran along the dock and dramatically leaped onto the submarine, only to loose her footing and fall down on her butt. It would have been funny to see an older woman do such an Olympic act and crash onto the sub, if it weren't for the comment about robots and guns.

John, closely followed by Brigid and the Captain, rushed over to help her up.

"Calm down Doctor Akana. Just take a few seconds and take a few deep breaths. Good. Now tell us again, this time slowly and clearly and fully, what happened."

Noelani Akana stood there and took a few deep breaths (Though they were more like gasps). In a few moments she started to explain to us what happened, and as she got further into it, all our eyes widened so that they almost matched Doctor Akana's in size.

"Back there," she began shakily, still not fully recuperated pointing the way she had come, "Robots, swarming around four kids. With wings….Fighting. Gunshots….Explosions!"

_Well, geez, don't freak or anything. But I guess were just used to that kind of thing... _Fang and I exchanged a bewildered glance (or at least that what I looked like, Fang's eyes were as emotionless as ever) then looked at the rest of the flock, who were doing the same. _Other kids? Like us? Fighting M-Geeks?_

"Uh, Max? Are we going to…" Nudge didn't finish. She didn't need to. We were all thinking the same thing.

"But we don't even know who they are…or her, for that matter," the Gasman said, gesturing to Noelani. "It could be a trap."

"Yeah she could be working for them and we would just be like running through the woods and then they could have mines for something and it would just be like _KA-POW!!!_, no more flock, and then they would destroy the world and there would be like no one to stop them 'cause we would be--"

"Doctor Akana is NOT working for _them_." Captain Perry finally succeeded in interrupting Nudge. "I have known her for years, probably for longer than most of you have lived. Trust me. She's _fine_."

"Plus," Iggy said, "you can hear the guns going off. And they sound heavy-duty too." He added just after a very loud and deep one sounded.

"Okay," I said, making one of my famous, split-second decisions. "We'll check it out." _What am I supposed to do? Go back to the sub when there could be more kids like us fighting M-Geeks? Ha!_

Still amazed at the possibility of there being more "Avian-Americans", I raced to the other end of the sub and jumped over the railing, letting my wings whoosh out to catch the easy ocean wind._ What the freaking heck am I getting us into?_

* * *

I gaped at the scene below us. In the middle of the road (and many yards surrounding it) were a dozen of fighting M-Geeks. There was so much carnage around the area, that I thought there must have been hundreds of them at the before all of this started. Robotic arms, heads, hands, legs, feet. There was blood, too, but a lot of it was covered by wires and circuits. There were fresh, gaping holes in the buildings around the intersection. I'm guessing some of the bots had some sort of small missiles.

Then, I realized, in the middle of all the wreckage and destruction, was a kid, maybe fourteen or fifteen, fighting tooth and nail with the remaining M-Geeks. And he was loosing. Bad. He seemed to be almost out of strength.

As we swooped closer, we heard him scream at the M-Geek he was fighting with a sudden burst of energy, "WHERE…IS…MY…FLOCK…YOU…FREAKING…B******!?"

Then we could see what probably shouldn't've shocked us, but still did. Because, you know, we always meet up with other kids that have FREAKING WINGS ATTATCHED TO THEIR BACK!

_**Crag POV**_

I kicked the bot I was fighting down with my last burst of tempered strength. He fell to the ground, dead. Or what ever you call a robot that is, well, no longer working. How many moreBut I hardly had time to take in a breath before the next two were on me. I fought as hard as I could, but they still landed blow after blow on my legs and stomach. I tried to motovate myself into a more defensive position, both physically and mentally, but the stupid tricked-out Andrew Martins just kept wouldn't let up. I thought about my family, my flock, who desparatly needed me. I thought about how much I hated Itex or whoever was threatening the world these days. I thought about Gale...

Unable to take any more, I collapsed into a mess of broken bones and bloody wings. But they kept on attacking me, kicking and picking me up and throwing me down again. They're built for this. I knew they wouldn't stop until I was dead, or almost dead so they could take me back to those aweful labs without a fight. Then, just before I blacked out, I saw a flurry of black and brown feathers, and my attackers stopped…

_**Max POV**_

Fang and I lunged downward an forward at the boy's attackers, the rest of the flock in hot pursuit. A round of speedy punches took care of my bot while Fang kicked out his M-Geek's ankle, then threw him aside. Nudge and Angel were back-to-back, fighting together in one of the many maneuvers we had practiced. Gazzy and Iggy had landed a few yards away and were taking small, round things out of their packs, then they rushed in to join in the "fun".

Fang had faught his way to the unconscious boy and was fighting to keep the remaining robots away. I was about to make my way over to help him, but then I saw that Gazzy had already beat me to him, and I turned my immediate attention back to the M-Geeks.

After a few minutes of hand to hand…err…claw, fighting (They must have used up all of their ammo on the other kids, assuming there were more than the unconscious one, again assuming that the doc was right), there were only three or four left, which we easily took care of, with the help of Ig and Gaz's mini-bombs. Once I finished off the last one, we all took a minute to do a systems check, and then were about to go and look at the boy, when Brigid Dwyer and four other people rushed out of the woods, two of them carrying a stretcher, being careful not to trip over any of the M-Geeks bodiless limbs. We hurried with them over to the other winged kid.

"I thought she said there were four?" Brigid pondered, watching as the other four Navy troopers carefully picked the mystery kid from the pile of rubble he had landed on. I noticed his wings resembled mine a little, or at least seemed like they did, it was a little hard to tell because of the blood that made the feathers stick together. It was also hard to make out his facial features through the scratches and wounds. He had cuts everywhere, and one foot and an elbow were bent in weird ways, broken.

"I think the rest were taken away by some of the M-Geeks," I replied, remembering his last words before they had overtaken him. Another wave of curiosity ran through me._ Another flock?_

"So what are we going to do? Take him with us? We can't really just leave him, can we?" Nudge asked, looking up at me.

I hesitated. We didn't know this guy. What if he decided to try and kill us for some reason? Or what if--. _Why would he be fighting the M-Geeks if he wasn't on your side._ Oy. Ladies and gentlemen, the Voice has entered the building! _Well, he could be on a third side or something, okay? I'm just trying to protect my flock, so butt out._ I waited for another Confucius reply, but I didn't get one, so I turned back to the expecting eyes of my flock.

Nudge was right. We couldn't just leave another birdkid here, where more M-Geeks could find him. It was too big of an opportunity to waste. I sighed. I was probably gonna regret this at some point.

"Alright, he can come. But I'm not making any promises for anything that might happen after we save my mom."

Nudge was instantly talking a mile a minute after I made my confirmation. But I just let her talk and droned out and walked with the Navy people back to the sub. Fang came up next to me. "You're goin' soft, ya know."

I whipped my head around to face him, and saw him grinning at me. I sighed again and rolled my eyes at him as we got on the path that lead through the trees and back to the sub.

**A/N: This is my first actual story so I will readily accept suggestions! And what do you think of the story? Do you like it so far? Tell me!**

**And PLEASE review!!! I'm really unsure about this story, and I need some comments on what I did good and what I didn't do good. Did I jump into the plot too fast? I really need pointers here people! Thanks!!!**


	4. Chapter 2: The Awakening

**A/N: Okay, so, yeah, I kinda took a LOT of quotes from the fifth book in this chapter, so until about a quarter of the way, it will probably be a review to a lot of you, so feel free to skip that part. I also would like to point out that I do NOT take credit for these quotes, obviously, and any of the characters except for Crag. So yeah, read and PLEASE review! I need pointers!**

_**Max POV**_

Apparently, the mystery bird-boy had received a few devastating blows to the head, and was in a coma. A pretty bad one too, from what the medics on the sub were saying. They said it was a fifty/fifty chance for him to recover from it. I instinctively interpreted that as a twenty/eighty chance. That is, if he was built the same way we were, which he most likely was, because he looked a lot like us, structure wise. He was very tall and lean, just a bit shorter than Fang, and he had around the same wingspan as I did. In fact, his wings resembled mine a lot. He probably had the same species of bird DNA as me.

**(A/N: This is basically just an excerpt from captor 54 of MAX, just reworded a little. Sorry.) **Later that week we had our little heart-attack-o-shark escapade. I swear I was gonna kill Angel for blatantly disobeying a direct order. She was in deep, stinky sneakers. As soon as Angel had wrapped a towel around her, I pounced.

"You've got to quit just thinking about yourself!" Angel didn't look to happy and put on her pout face.

_And you've got to start paying more attention to her, _said the ever-annoying Voice. _And to what she's saying._

"Oh, like I don't do that already?" Oops, did I just say that out loud? I apparently had, as I was met by a confused look from Angel. "Never mind. But I was worried sick while you were out there!"

"You're worrying about the wrong things, Max. You should be trying to breathe under water and taking care of yourself. You don't have to worry about me."

"It's my job to worry about you! It always has been!" I was shocked.

"Were family, Max. I'm not a job," She said sadly.

Fang made me jump by saying, "Okay, lets break it up." I hadn't heard him come in. Surprise, surprise. Angel left to go change, Total on her heels.

"You handled that really well, Fang." Ugh. Brigid. What's she congratulating HIM for? Waddid he say, six words? His royal majesty speaketh!

"Can we have a meeting? With the flock?" I asked him, swallowing my annoyance. I got a nod in response.

"That's a good idea. I'd like to ask you—" started Brigid.

"This is flock business," I said abruptly

"But, were all a team," said Brigid, taken aback.

"Yes, and I really, really appreciate everyone's help in finding my mom. But some things are still just for the flock, it's always been that way, and it'll always be that way, 'Cause when it comes right down to it, there's us six, and no one else is like we are."

Brigid looked disappointed but just nodded. Fang and I headed down to the rather small bunk room we all shared.

I saw Gazzy stuff something behind his pillow as soon as Fang and I entered the room, and the pyro duo put on their innocent look which I knew so well. Angel and Total were looking at a magazine and Nudge was reorganizing, reordering, and well, redesigning her khaki uniform.

My eyes found the wires poking out from underneath Gaz's pillow. "Gazzy, I swear, if you've stolen a nuclear device, I will—"

"It's not nuclear!" he insisted.

Satisfied enough (for now), I sat down on the bed and ran through a couple of discussion starters. Let's face it, I'm not exactly the president of the Touchy-Feely Corporation. As I was thinking, I heard Fang and Iggy talking about the birdkid we saved a couple days ago. Iggy said that the medics think that even if he does wake up(basically 'when' to us), they were assuming that he would have amnesia. Well that sucked. They wouldn't be able to milk him for information on the possibility of more birdkids. Anyway, I decided to just jump right into it.

"Guys, I feel like we've gotten off track." Everyone stopped to listen.

"What do you mean, Max?" Nudge asked.

"Well, we've been hanging with the navy for days now, and we're not any closer to rescuing my mom. At first it seemed to make sense to hook up with them, but now I'm wondering if they have any real plans. And now with this other guy with wings popping up. I don't know. I think we need to get our priorities straight. First comes my mom. Then come finding out who this kid is and all of the other things. I'm thinking — well, I'm thinking that I want to give the navy another twelve hours. And if we haven't made any real progress, if we're not any closer to rescuing my mom, then I think we should ditch 'em and head out on our own."

I was nervous as I waited, my heart in my throat, as they looked at me. Did they still all want to follow me, or did they want grownups to tell them what to do?

Then Fang put out his fist. Then Nudge and Gazzy popped theirs on top. Then Angel and Iggy followed suit and then Total put his paw on top of everybody's fists, sticking out like a sore thumb—err—claw. Then I put my fist on top of totals paw.

"All for one and one for all," said Fang. "That was from a movie."

"Thanks guys," I said, my smile tickling my ears it was so wide. "Now let's get this show on the road."

Then there was a knock on the door, and one of the navy medics popped in. "I was told to inform you that your friend has come out of his coma and appears to be healthy enough, though has been diagnosed with amnesia. He will be confined to a separate room for a week or two, but is expected to make a full recovery, both physically and mentally very soon." after he had recited his message, he promptly stepped back out of the door and closed it behind him, without a smile or a nod or any sort of kind gesture. Bunch of stiffs.

We all looked at each other for a second, then stood up excitedly and made our way to where—well whatever his name is was taken to have medical attention.

* * *

I took a deep breath. My flock was all crowded around the oval door, eager to find out more about more (free) mutant birdkids. I have to confess, I was a little excited too. I mean, how often, really, do we get to meat other kids like us. But I was nervous too. What if he _was_a bad guy. Like an undercover bad guy, like those kids who were spies sent by Itex, and that woman who turned out to be a robot, who got taken by the sea lion?

_Don't worry, Max. This is all part of the bigger picture, the whole plan. You're going to need more help with saving the world than you may know._ Whoa! Hold it! Back the train up! What was that again? But the Voice didn't reply. Of course.

I opened the door a crack, and six heads and a muzzle leaned forward a bit.

"I _told_you. I. Don't. Know. ANYTHING!" came a voice, which must have been the mystery kid. I opened the door all the way and stepped inside. It was a smallish room, about the size of the flocks bunkroom, except it had medicine bottles and needles and other things that made my edge-o-meter turn up a notch or two, so I stopped looking at my surroundings and at what's-his-name, who was laying down on a bed, looking very relaxed. He was looking at me groggily, but didn't seem surprised or anything.

"Hi," I introduced myself. "I'm Max."

"Okay," was all he said. I waited a few seconds as my flock filed in.

"…And…you are?" I prompted.

He shrugged. "I don't know." Great.

"You don't even know your name?" Angel piped right up. He just shook his head nonchalantly, like it was no big deal to wake up in a submarine hundreds of thousands of feet below sea level, and, oddly enough, surrounded by children and a dog.

No one spoke in a few seconds, in which I noticed a navy medic, a different one than before, writing on a clipboard. "Err, do you mind?"

She looked up, almost appearing to be annoyed at being disturbed from her work, then what I had asked her registered and she sighed and left the room, closing the steel door behind her.

_**Crag POV**_

"Okay. Do you know anything about more kids like you? Family? A 'flock'?" the woman who kinda looked like a doctor asked.

Flock. That was a weird word. And what did she mean by more kids like me? Why was I so special?

"I _told _you. I. Don't. Know. ANYTHING!" I replied. Why all of these stupid questions? I had a bad headache, and all I wanted to do really was sleep, not answer dumba—…stupid questions.

The door suddenly swung open and I looked up at the girl who stepped in.

"Hi. I'm Max," she said. Okay. Random kid. I can deal with that.

"Okay," I said, not really interested. I couldn't really tell her my name because, well, I didn't _know_ my own name.

"…And…you are?" She said sarcastically, like I was dumb or something.

"I don't know," I said, trying not to start a conversation, so she wouldn't stay very long. And it was the truth, too, I had absolutely no clue of who I was or what I was doing here, or where 'here' even was.

She looked disappointed as five other kids and, adding to the randomness, a scottie, entered the room and all looked at me, like I was radioactive or something. There were two guys who looked around my age, one of them wasn't really looking directly at me, I think he was actually looking at me left ear, and had paler skin and reddish-blond hair. The other one had darker hair, skin, and eyes with an emotionless face. Then there was another girl that was maybe ten or eleven, who had chocolate colored skin and dark hair, a boy maybe nine years old or so, with messy blond hair, and a little girl, probably something around seven, with curly blond hair.

Then the first girl asked the medic to leave, and I gave a mental sigh of relief. But _they_ were still in the room, whoever they were. I just wanted to sleep, I didn't really care about anything else right now. My head hurt pretty bad, and I felt sore. Then I noticed something about the first girl, the one who called herself Max. I couldn't put my finger right on it, but something about her just seemed…right. Familiar. I don't know.

"Well, anyway, I'm Nudge, this is Gazzy, and Angel" Said the dark skinned girl, gesturing to first the youngest boy and then to the little girl. "And this is Iggy and fang," she then pointed to each of the oldest boys. "We're all birdkids with wings, just like you! It's so exciting! I mean, we knew that there might have been other kids like us, but we thought that they would have been all in one of the schools. We never thought that there might have been another one that was surviving on their own, fighting the bad guys. And now you show up, and--_mrph_." Thank God. My headache was getting worse at every fast-paced word. The one they called Iggy ('nuther funny word, there) had clapped his hand over the girl's mouth. I noticed then that he was blind, because he was just looking straight ahead, and not really moving his eyes much, like he was looking at his surroundings. That must suck.

Wait, hold it, birdkids? What are those? They have wings? _I _have wings? I felt my brows furrow in confusion.

Seeing my perplexed expression, Max looked at the littlest girl, Angel, questioningly. Angel just shook her head and shrugged.

"He's very confused," she said. "His mind is very clear though. Kind of reminds me of when our computer used to crash every so often when we were living in the house. Totally clean, new."

Hold it again, my _mind?!_ She can hear what I'm thinking?! Note to self: be very wary of Angel. She grinned at me and I wondered if she'd heard that too. _Yup, _I heard in my head which made me jump about three inches and yelp. Angel giggled and covered her mouth.

Deciding to ignore it for now, I found myself asking, "W…wings?"

"Yup, we all got 'em. And so do you. You can't even remember that?" asked Gazzy.

"Umm…no?" I replied, still unsure of myself. I then tried to turn my head around to look at my back, but instantly turned it back. It hurt too much to turn my head like that. But I did catch a flash of brown feathers. I frowned. Now that they mention it, I could feel them pulled in against my back. This was getting weirder and weirder by the minute. But, for some reason, the wings didn't surprise me as much as I would have thought.

I looked back at the boy who had last spoken, to find him stretching his own pair of wings out as much as the small space allowed him. It took me by surprise, but I wasn't exactly gaping at him. This is just too weird. And…not weird enough…. Ugh, I just need to sleep.

But I guess Max had already guessed what I was about to say, because she said, "Okay guys, shows over, lets let him get some rest."

Reluctantly, the three younger kids trudged out of the strange oval door, followed by Fang and Iggy, and finally Max. She gave me a reassuring smile before closing the door behind her. I managed a light grin back and let my head fall back on my pillow.

_**Max POV**_

I closed the door behind my flock. I dropped the smile off my face and replaced it with a confused look.

"What's wrong, Max?" Nudge asked, looking up at me.

"Nothing. I just wish I would have known he would have been this useless from the beginning, we wouldn't have had to bother with him then."

"Max! You don't really think that," she said, eyes wide.

"No, no, I'm just kidding!" I sighed.

Then, as the flock made their way toward the bunkroom again, I walked the other way, consumed with my own thoughts. There was something about him, not how he looked or anything, that just seemed…I don't know. It was hard to explain. There was something about him that seemed…different? No not really. It wasn't the way he acted either. There was just—well, just something that I cant specifically call on.

Of course, anyone that seems strange in any way automatically sets off little Max-alarms in my head, so I told myself to be cautious of him.

**A/N: Kay, so I'm not sure if this is a good story so far. If it is, PLEASE tell me, cause if no one's gonna read it, I'm not sure if I wanna write it. PLEASE review! I need constructive criticism here!! kthnxbye!!!**


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